


Tommy Knows: "Darkness on the Edge of Town"

by ThomE_Gemcity_06



Series: Eloquence of a Secret [22]
Category: Arrow (TV 2012)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon-divergence, Angst, Canon-Typical Violence, Drama, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Episode: s1e22 - “Darkness on the Edge of Town", Family Drama, Friendship, Gen, Minor SPOILER for - "Sacrifice", Secrets, Tommy Knows!, casework, relationship drama
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-07-05
Updated: 2017-07-05
Packaged: 2018-11-28 04:33:47
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,108
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11410305
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ThomE_Gemcity_06/pseuds/ThomE_Gemcity_06
Summary: Tommy begged his father to be more involved, and now he is, but he's put in a precarious position that could expose Team Hood and has to act accordingly.





	Tommy Knows: "Darkness on the Edge of Town"

**Author's Note:**

> **Disclaimer: I don't own Arrow, its episodes or its characters.  
>  Tag: Season 1, Episode 22 - "Darkness on the Edge of Town" **

**aRROW**

Tommy gulped as he watched his father don his Dark Hood in his office at Merlyn Global. "What are you going to do?" he'd told his father that he wanted to be more involved and Malcolm had kept true to his promise. The recording of his mother dying had cemented what his father was doing and was not going to stop if asked nicely.

"Tie up some loose ends." Malcolm adjusted the strap of his quiver over his chest.

"You mean kill them." He corrected boldly, his fist clenched at his thigh.

"Tommy," Malcolm sighed. Tommy stood still as he approached and put a hand on his shoulder. "We've been over this, I thought you understood."

"Necessary sacrifice." Tommy forced himself not to choke on the two words. "I do, dad. I do. But--"

"No, buts..." Malcolm shook his head. "As soon as The Undertaking happens, these people will make the connection to us. I've interacted with them. They'll go to the police and this whole thing will have been for nothing, we'll never be able to fix it." He cupped his son's cheek, "We have to fix it, Tommy. Do you understand? Only we can."

"Yeah." Tommy clapped his wrist. "Yeah."

"Good man." Malcolm turned back to his cache and picked up his bow. "I'll be back within two hours."

"And I'll be here," he addressed his father's retreating back.

As soon as the door closed, Tommy sucked in a huge shuddering breath. "Shit!" He putted his hands over his face and scrubbed, trying to get his heart-pace back into acceptable rates before he had some sort of panic attack.

He stared at the little painting on the wall, beyond which lay the fingerprint and pass code pad, and beyond that lay his father's collective Dark Archer arsenal. He shivered. He may not be able to save those people that Malcolm was about to murder, but he sure as hell could take advantage of his father's absence.

Tommy left his father's office, and went quickly down the empty hall to his own. He stepped on the bottom slide on the door, locking it, before he pulled out his cell and quickly dialled. He paced in the large space as the line rung and continued to ring.

"Come on. Pick up, pick up!" he uttered.

" _Tommy!"_ Felicity answered happily. " _I did not forget about dinner. I cannot wait to be eaten out-- I meant eat **ing** outside, in a restaurant, with you, across from me. Like a normal couple, because **I** am normal—I swear--"_

"Felicity!" Tommy interrupted her. "Dinner is going to have to wait."

" _What_?" she asked in dejection. " _But I was just about to leave QC_."

"Don't leave QC!" Tommy told her. "I need you at a computer, now. Preferably at QC."

" _Why? What's happening_?" she panted a little as he could hear the faint echo of her heeled steps.

"Are you there?"

" _Yes, accompanied with some weird looks from the night guard at the front desk in the lobby_." Felicity grumbled, " _Not that he has a leg to stand on. I mean, he has two legs, obviously, but I know he watches porn_." She whispered the word just like it was naughty. " _I have access to the entire buildings' computer activity; glitches all the time!"_

"Great." Tommy inhaled. "Do you remember Unidac Industries?"

" _Um_ ," she paused briefly in thought. " _When I first met Oliver he brought me that shot-up laptop. It had the blueprints to the Exchange Building where Unidac was holding an auction for the company. Walter got the bid for Queen Consolidated."_

"Yes," he nodded. "My dad's been doing business with them."

" _What? But they're QC's."_

"On The Dark Archer's behalf." He supplied.

" _Oh._ " she said. " ** _Oh._** _That's not good."_

"It's not," he agreed. "He was overseeing one of their projects, connected to The Undertaking. He's over there right now, tying up loose ends. Can you hack into their network, pull their project contracts? Or better yet, can you access all that through the QC network?"

" _I should be able to pull it all up from QC's network_ ," Felicity voiced distractedly as she typed. " _It'll take me a few hours to go through it all, though._ "

"Okay." He exhaled heavily and slumped in the nearest conference chair at the table in his office. "Okay." He felt some of the weight shifted from his shoulders.

" _I guess this means dinner is off?_ "

"Not off, just... postponed. I'm sorry, Felicity." He whispered.

" _It's not your fault, we can always reschedule."_ she promised. _"Besides... I'd be jealous if you called some other blond computer genius with this."_

"You're the only computer genius I know, blond or otherwise." He swore. "You are my first and only call, Felicity Smoak. There's no one I know like you."

" _You always know exactly what to say, don't you_."

"Just calling it like I see it, darling." He replied smoothly. "Nothing but the truth."

" _Darling_?" she squeaked.

"Uh," he cleared his throat, straightening in the chair. "Is that a good squeak or a bad squeak?"

" _It's a different squeak_." Felicity admitted. " _No one's ever called me darling before. Well, besides my mom. But you're not my mom. Definitely not my mom. It would be weird if I had sexy feelings towards my mom—which I don't—just you, because you're sexy. And I think that we've established that I find you very, very, very attractive during this conversation—and that was too many very's_." She muttered to herself, and he could just picture her squeezing her eyes shut in embarrassment and thumping her forehead.

"There can never be too many 'very's', Felicity." He teased with a chuckle. "It's one thing to think you're sexy, it's an entirely different thing when an incredible woman tells you. And I think 'darling' is _very_ suitable; you are beautiful inside and out, Felicity."

She hummed in response across the line and he could hear the faint click as she typed, there was just a quietness between them as they just listened to each other breathe.

"When you find something, call Oliver." Tommy finally said after a few stretched minutes.

_"He's with Laurel."_ She blurted.

"He is?" Tommy asked in surprise. "Did she come to him or did he go to her?"

" _Him to her_."

"Wow," Tommy murmured. "I usually have to trick him into a room with her. Have I been gone so long that he finally grew a pair of heart-balls while I'm gone."

" _Heart-balls_?" she laughed. " _You actually transformed love into guy-speak_."

"Hm. I haven't been to the lair much since we got Walter back and I convinced dad to let me in more. I've been trying to keep up with the water slapping, but it's an activity that's a little difficult to do around the house inconspicuously with my dad watching my every move." Tommy mused, "I've taken to taking suspiciously long baths."

" _What_?" she was incredulous. " _How does that work_?"

"I pretty much just do it naked, Felicity." He said without preamble or shame.

" _Well_..." she stuttered, inhaling deeply. " _That's... nice_."

"I'm glad you think so." He grinned.

He heard her inhale deeply, fighting to urge to over explain and correct herself; he was surprised when she managed to say instead: " _I'll call Oliver when I find something, mid Laurel-session or not_." Felicity promised. " _Ack_!" she realized what she said. " _Bye, Tommy_."

"Goodnight, Felicity." He chuckled and hung up. He sighed, setting his cell on the conference table and leaning back in the chair.

His cell beeped. He sat up and picked it up. "Shit." It was about to die on him. Standing, he went and unlocked his office door before going around to his desk. He searched through the drawers until he found a charger and plugged his phone in. And then he went and poured himself a whiskey from the decanter and threw back two fingers, savouring the burn down his throat. He poured another before he put the decanter down, but he didn't drink and instead looked down into the amber liquid as he swirled it.

"Let's head home," Malcolm said.

Tommy started. He put down the whiskey and turned towards his father; out of The Dark Archer hood, and back into his slick suit. No one would suspect that he'd just been off... killing. "How-- it went... okay?" Tommy asked. How had his life become asking his father how his _murder_ went?

"Now there's nothing to stop us from going ahead with The Undertaking," Malcolm said. "The device will be placed and--"

"And level the Glades." Tommy finished, trying to keep the horror contained. But Team Hood couldn't stop The Dark Archer until they knew _how_ he was going to do it.

"And then we'll rebuild." Malcolm put an arm around his shoulder and led him from the office.

...

And it was as Tommy lay in bed, fighting to fall asleep, that he realized he'd forgot his cell charging in his office at MG. He wondered if it would look suspicious if he went to get it now. He knew it would. Malcolm would wonder what could be so important that he couldn't wait until morning when he went to work; why he couldn't just use the house's landline if it was that urgent.

He'd painted himself into a corner, accidentally or not, and now he was forced to wait for the paint to dry.

**X**

Another layer of paint was applied as he slept and Tommy never even made it to Merlyn Global Group before he was diverted to S.C.P.D. as a representative of his father's company to give the police anything they needed for their investigation of the slaughter at Unidac Industries the previous night. Apparently one of the victims made a call to one of the unclaimed lines at MG. He spent the entire afternoon being the-guy-who-worked-there-for-thirty-seconds.

When Lance finally dismissed him, he was trying to decide if he'd be able to make a pit-stop at the lair and figure out what the hell was going on—the stress was going to give him an ulcer—but his father’s driver/bodyguard made the decision for him.

**...**

Tommy's cell was exactly where he'd left it on the charger at his desk. There were dozens of missed calls and messages. He clicked on the most recent, which was about an hour old. Felicity’s voice was filled with urgency and sent Tommy running.

What the hell was Oliver thinking, going after Malcolm now, without even warning Tommy first—going after him _alone?_

He could hear the fight even before he got to his father's office doors.

"Dad--!" Tommy stopped short as watched his father crouch beside an unconscious Hood. He jolted forward a step, his arm out, to... shove Malcolm away, shield Oliver, he didn't even know. But it was too late as Malcolm pushed Oliver's Hood away and he felt bile in his throat.

"Oh, no." Malcolm whispered in dread as he saw his son's best-friend.

"Oliver!" Tommy couldn't stop the cry and Malcolm looked over to him, rising. "Dad-- What--? What the hell?!" he managed, using the natural panic, fear, and helplessness to fool his father. "What the hell is going on? Oliver--?"

"Did you know about this?" Malcolm questioned, gesturing at Oliver at his feet.

"What?" Tommy asked in shock. "How could I--"

"He's your best-friend, Thomas. You two are as close as brothers." He replied in a hard tone. "How could you have not known?"

"The same way I didn't know about you!" Tommy shouted back. "He was stuck on a deserted island for five-years, he never wanted to talk about it. Just like you left for two-years and never talked about it until now. How could I have known that about him after not knowing him for five-years, when I never even suspected about me own father!?" his chest heaved and unshed tears sprung unbidden to his eyes.

"Alright." Malcolm said. "I had to ask, Tommy."

"What are you going to do with him?" he asked in a small voice.

"I can't just let him go," he murmured. "You know that."

"Don't hurt him." Tommy pleaded. It felt like his heart was tearing; he wanted to leap across, get his father away from Oliver when he was so vulnerable and helpless, end this here, tonight. But he couldn't, he wasn't strong enough. If Oliver couldn't defeat him, then how was he supposed to?

"I won't." Malcolm put his phone to his ear. "I'm just going to remove him temporarily from the board until The Undertaking is finished, and then he can't do any more damage."

_f_

**aRROW**

**Author's Note:**

> _Somehow I finished this in one night, when I've been pretty much freaking out about what the heck I was going to do with it since chapter one. Now I'm just freaking out about the next episode! The finale..._  
>  I mean, it can't end the same, right? Tommy can't still die, can he? Hm...  
> 


End file.
